Reading fluency has been identified by the National Reading Panel (2000;
www.nationalreadingpanel.org)
as one of the five critical components of reading, along with phonemic
awareness,
phonics and decoding, vocabulary, and comprehension. The contribution of comprehension and vocabulary knowledge to skillful reading has long been understood by researchers and practitioners. Discussions about the importance of phonemic awareness and phonics have been continuing for decades, and an increasing body of evidence strongly underscores the fundamental roles these two elements. However, the focus on the value of fluency is relatively new.

Fluency is now understood to be a unique and fundamental component of
skilled, proficient reading because of its close link to comprehension
and motivation.
Students who struggle with fluency, even if their phonemic awareness
skills and vocabulary knowledge is strong, and even if they have good word
analysis,
phonics and decoding skills, will most likely have difficulty understanding
what they have read. These students will also be much less likely to
read for pleasure and enjoyment.

If a student is struggling with reading, we must check to see if fluency
is contributing to their difficulty, rather than just focusing in on
helping
improve that student's
comprehension skills. As Joe Torgeson has stated: "There is no comprehension strategy that compensates
for difficulty reading words accurately & fluently." Return to
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There are 3 different roles for fluency assessments: screening, diagnosis,
and progress monitoring.

Screening:
Screening assessments are used to FIND those students
who may be having problems in reading. The "gold standard"
of screening tools all use some kind of fluency measure (accuracy +
speed/rate) such as The Reading Fluency Benchmark Assessor (RFBA) or
DIBELS. The assessment of oral reading fluency by listening to a one
minute sample of oral reading from unpracticed, grade level text, has
been shown to predict overall reading ability with a high degree of
accuracy, especially in the primary grades. Oral reading fluency scores
of words correct per minute (wcpm) can be compared to benchmark norms
to determine if a student may need assistance in reading. The Hasbrouck
& Tindal norms were developed for this purpose.

Diagnosis:
Once it has been determined that a student is having
problems with reading, it is important to determine "why"?
What is contributing to or causing these problems? Diagnostic assessments are used by teachers to determine a student's strengths and needs in the five key areas of phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension. Diagnostic assessments of fluency are similar to the screening assessments, except now the one minute assessments of oral reading fluency are conducted in instructional level text rather than grade level text.
For example, if a 5th grade student is reading at about the 3rd grade level, we would assess his fluency using unpracticed passages of 3rd grade text. That score can then be compared to benchmark scores of 3rd graders to determine if that student's fluency is on track for their level of reading development. (NOTE: a 5th grader who is reading at the 3rd grade level will clearly need a serious reading intervention that will likely include some fluency practice. It is also possible that diagnostic assessments will indicate that the cause of this student's reading problems are primarily in the areas of phonics/decoding or even phonemic awareness.)

To
diagnose phonics and decoding concerns, you may want to use a tool like
the Quick Phonics Screener (QPS), developed by Dr. Jan Hasbrouck.
The QPS is an informal, individually administered diagnostic assessment.
Teachers can use the results to plan students' instructional or intervention
programs in basic word reading and decoding skills and to monitor students'
progress as their phonics skills develop.The QPS is available at www.readnaturally.com

Progress
monitoring: Fluency measures are also used to help determine
if a student's SKILLS ARE IMPROVING in an instruction or intervention
program. Using weekly or bimonthly one minute assessments of oral reading
fluency using unpracticed passages at a student's instructional level
or goal level can be used by a teacher to make decisions about the effectiveness
of an instructional program.Return to Questions...

Researchers have identified three ways to improve students' reading fluency:
teacher modeling, repeated reading, and progress monitoring. The Read
Naturally strategy has combined these three components:

&nbsp &nbsp 1. A student reads a challenging piece of text aloud and &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp records the
words correct
per minute score on a &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp graph.
&nbsp &nbsp 2. The student then reads along, aloud, while
that same &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp piece of text is
read aloud
by a narrator (on an audio &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp tape, CD,
computer, or read by a teacher or tutor).
&nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp The purpose of this step is to
build the
student's &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp accuracy in reading the text.
It will typically take &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp
about 3
readings of the text to develop sufficient &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp comfort
and accuracy of
each reading, &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp until a predetermined goal is met (usually about 30 &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp
to
40 words
above the original &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp reading in Step #1.) Students will often
need to do &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp about
4 or 5 practice
readings to meet their goal.
&nbsp &nbsp
3. The teacher listens to the student read the text to
&nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp determine if the
fluency goal
has been met.
&nbsp &nbsp
4. The student gets to graph this new, successful score
&nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp
on
the graph in
a second color.
&nbsp &nbsp
5. Additional activities can be added to these steps,
&nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp including an oral or written retell, answering questions
&nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp about the passage,etc. Return to
Questions...

A reading coach can be defined as: "an experienced teacher
who has a strong knowledge base in reading and experience providing
effective reading instruction to students, especially struggling readers.
In addition, a reading coach has been trained to work effectively with
peer colleagues to help them improve their students' reading outcomes
and receives support in the school for providing coaching." (Hasbrouck
& Denton, 2005).Return to Questions...

Many people think that the primary role of a reading coach doing is to watch a teacher teach a reading lesson, and then provide feedback to that teacher, including making suggestions for how to improve the lesson.

This is certainly something that reading coaches can do. It may even
be the centerpiece of their coaching efforts, but…coaching is much more
complex and involved than this.

In order to observe and provide feedback to a teacher, the coach first has to
establish a professional relationship with that teacher. Given that the role
of "reading coach" is
so new to most schools, the role itself needs to be introduced to the teachers
and administrator. Decisions will need to be made about several issues: What
services will the coach be providing? How will the coach be evaluated by the
principal/supervisor? How will issues of confidentiality be handled? How will
the coach find the time to provide coaching services to colleagues?Return to
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Coaches who are skillful and experienced reading teachers will often need
to learn several new skills to become an equally skillful coach. These skills
include:

establishing a professional, collaborative relationship with colleagues (trust building/"entry"); managing professional time communicating effectively with colleagues, parents, and administrators, especially when discussing emotionally challenging topics; working effectively with a team to address student or school concerns; collecting and analyzing data for problem-solving and coaching (conducting interviews, observations, and assessments); providing specific feedback to a teacher for improving instructional skills and strategies; designing and conducting
professional inservice trainings helping provide systems-level consultation to address school-wide or district-wide
concerns.Return to
Questions...

This term means different things to different people. In general when educators talk about differentiating instruction they mean planning lessons and providing instruction and practice activities that are appropriate for each student's individual background and skill levels. It suggests that at least some instruction would be provided to small groups of students.
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Creating permanent, homogeneous groups of students based on their academic ability has been shown to be an ineffective way to differentiate instruction. The small groups should instead by flexible and reformed from time to time to allow groupings of students for different reasons and sometimes even pair students at different skill levels.
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This is an important question that must be addressed if a teacher is going to be successful with differentiating instruction. A key place to start is to rethink how the classroom is organized and managed that will allow a teacher to work with the whole class but also have the time to work with small groups. To get started, an instructional schedule needs to be developed, to map out the blocks of time to provide
whole class instruction and a few blocks of 20-25 minute periods where the teacher can teach smaller groups of students. Teachers should also think about creating a list of jobs for students-and train them how to do the jobs-- so students can manage their time while the teacher is busy teaching. A system for managing paperwork, supplies, and learning centers also need to be developed.
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